Steve Whitmire has left the Muppets, Matt Vogel to continue as Kermit

[LipsGF4Life]

C'mon guys, I'm sure someone else will perform them. I know they're more minor characters, but I don't think they're being retired. Well, at least not Rizzo. Not too sure about Lips, because he really isn't seen too much.

Don't say that!! Someone WILL perform the best trumpet player in history!

 

[DarthGonzo]

Beyond upset hearing this; truthfully, I haven't liked how Disney has treated The Muppets for years, bordering since after the 2011 film, but this is beyond ridiculous.. any respect I had for the company as a whole is gone; recasting such a core performer is absolutely insane, not to mention the fact that they didn't even give Steve a chance to stand up for himself.. calling someone on the phone to tell them they're being recasted? Total jerk move, Disney.. I wish Matt luck, but truth be told, I'm kinda done with Disney's Muppets; because, in my opinion, they're now so little like what Jim and his team invisioned, they're just another of the hundreds of Disney franchises.

BAM! My sentiments exactly.

 

[Muppet Master]

Man, this is just heartbreaking to hear. I don't know why Disney fired Steve and what's going on, but Steve's statement was just so touching.

 

[Nasubionna]

Beyond upset hearing this; truthfully, I haven't liked how Disney has treated The Muppets for years, bordering since after the 2011 film, but this is beyond ridiculous.. any respect I had for the company as a whole is gone; recasting such a core performer is absolutely insane, not to mention the fact that they didn't even give Steve a chance to stand up for himself.. calling someone on the phone to tell them they're being recasted? Total jerk move, Disney.. I wish Matt luck, but truth be told, I'm kinda done with Disney's Muppets; because, in my opinion, they're now so little like what Jim and his team invisioned, they're just another of the hundreds of Disney franchises.

I agree with much of this. This news is stunning and beyond disappointing. I still like many things about Disney, but I agree that they have not handled the Muppets well and at this point I haven't felt very interested in or connected with any new Muppets material in years. For the time being, at least, Muppets are sadly off of my radar, except for my enjoyment of their older stuff. So sad.

 

[DarthGonzo]

Is it possible someone can FINALLY remove all the pinned threads for every "The Muppets" episode? This thread should really be at the top of the forum.

 

[Duke Remington]

Another theory I heard from somewhere else that I can see being a very strong possibility: Steve lives in Georgia while most of the other Muppeteers live in either New York or California.

And the top brass probably got fed up over the fact that Steve had a much longer commute to those places and suggested that Steve move from Atlanta to Los Angeles to make himself even more readily available, but it seems to me that Steve didn't wish to move away from Atlanta.

 

[LipsGF4Life]

This is a shock, even though his characters have barely been in anything new all year.

It's interesting that the news announcement was supposed to be exclusive to Tough Pigs and The Muppet Mindset, I first saw the news at Muppet Wiki - looking in the recent changes section, where I saw something about it noted in the edit summary. I wonder what the process was like for Disney wanting TP and the MM to announce it first.

After half a year of Steve being absent from a lot of things (and I've seen people remark that Dave and Bill have been absent a lot this year, have they done anything new recently, besides Waldorf appearing in a commercial?), it was great to see him as Kermit in a recent online video about the first day of summer. After hearing this news of Matt Vogel taking over, I wondered if maybe that was him and it went undetected by fans (though I've barely seen any online discussion of that online video). I wonder how long ago that was shot.

I hope Steve Whitmire will do an interview with one of the big Muppet fan sites or podcasts soon, though a more mainstream interview would be great as well. Although he's retired, I hope he will continue to be involved with non-fiction stuff about the Muppets, like interviews, exhibits, documentaries, audio commentaries (though I don't expect any new Muppet DVD or Blu-ray releases in the near future). I'd like to know how long he's been retired for.

One of my first thoughts was about how Vogel also performs Robin, and some people have been saying that Peter Linz will be taking over that role.

Beaker will likely be the easiest to recast, I'd like to think Rizzo will be recast, but then again, he has been underused in the past few years, outside of the 2015 series. And Dave Goelz revealed in 2014 that Steve had finally figured out who Lips is, so sad that he's retired so soon after that, though there has been plenty of opportunities where Lips could have spoken but didn't. I wonder if anybody will do fan art of The Newsman announcing his performers departure (which I have contemplated for The Muppet Mindset's "fan week", but am unsure. And no, I won't be mad if anybody else takes the idea after reading this).

It's interesting that Steve decided to retire so soon after The Muppets was canceled. I wonder if he would have held off on retiring if it had been renewed. At Tough Pigs, a few people have pointed out some parralells between Kermit's recasts. I saw one person point out that Jim and Frank were a team for 27 years before Jim died and now Stevehas performed Kermit for 27 years, and somebody else pointed out that Steve performed a frog with a voice similar to Kermit in 1984's The Muppets Take Manhattan and Matt performed Constantine in 2014's Muppets Most Wanted, but I've also thought of something similar: Jim Henson performed Kermit in two main Muppet shows and died a year after the second, Steve Whitmire performed Kermit in two main Muppet shows and retired a year after the second (or at least his retirement was announced a year later).

Recently, after thinking about how Steve had been absent from so many small productions and how Peter Linz performed Statler in a commercial, I decided to rewatch the opening for last year's Macy's Thanksgiving Parade, where Kermit didn't really get any of his own dialogue. I wondered if he wasn't there, but then I noticed some of his characters were heard. Beaker could clearly be heard and I think another character (probably Rizzo) could be heard singing with the others, even if it's not a solo line. I wonder if Steve did those lines (whether live or just pre-recorded) or if somebody else did the voices (it'd be hard to notice with them singing with others).

Im just upset and worried about Lips

 

[JimAndFrank]

Another theory I heard from somewhere else that I can see being a very strong possibility: Steve lives in Georgia while most of the other Muppeteers live in either New York or California.

And the top brass probably got fed up over the fact that Steve had a much longer commute to those places and suggested that Steve move from Atlanta to Los Angeles to make himself even more readily available, but it seems to me that Steve didn't wish to move away from Atlanta.

If that were an issue, they would have dismissed Steve years ago.

 

[Duke Remington]

If that were an issue, they would have dismissed Steve years ago.

I doubt that. They must've tried to make it work many, many, many, many, MANY times already and it is just now that they came to a point that it really wasn't practical and that it was time to give up on the whole thing.

 

[Rugratskid]

I doubt that. They must've tried to make it work many, many, many, many, MANY times already and it is just now that they came to a point that it really wasn't practical and that it was time to give up on the whole thing.

A company like Disney wouldn't have him commute for this long, and then abruptly decide that it's not worth the effort.. not a wise business choice; they would've axed him sooner, or not at all; at least, that's what I think, you could be right, who knows?

Has Steve ever butted heads with Disney prior? I'm seeing people mention it elsewhere, but I don't recall issues between Whitmire and any of the higher-ups. This definitely seems like Disney wanting to become more controlling with the franchise, something I didn't think was possible, honestly.. it always seems like within "The Muppets" (the show I mean) that the performers were given a strict script, with little room for improv, which is where I feel they shine their brightest, is playing off of each other.